Snowman
by Elf Asato
Summary: [No definite pairings, but still, GAY :P] Spoilers for X16. Subaru takes an aimless walk on a cold winter's day...and attempts to make out with a snowman.


**Title:** Snowman  
**Author:** Elf Asato  
**Written:** May 15, 2005  
**Summary:** Spoilers for X16+. Subaru takes an aimless walk on a cold winter's day (and attempts to make out with a snowman).  
**Disclaimer:** Not mine whatsoever.  
**Notes:** Crack! This is a bit bizarre, even for me... The style is deliberate, by the way, and kudos to you if you can make out the obscure book reference. 

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**Snowman**  
_By Elf Asato_  
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It was cold out, so very cold: harsh, biting, painful. Even though he was dressed in layers (_black upon black upon black upon black_), the wind and bits of snow were still like razorblades to his exposed cheeks and nose, which were now a lovely fire engine red.

But Subaru didn't mind. He didn't care at all, really, because the sensation of pain and cold so cold it was hot was vague and muted; he never felt wholly in tune with his physical body, after all. The feeling - or lackthereof - was there, but just barely, so he took no heed of it. His concentration was elsewhere: somewhere distant and foreign, nowhere. It didn't matter. He walked around that cold winter's day aimlessly, the Sakurazukamori reduced to a piece of driftwood, not knowing where he was going or why.

Initially he had started off in the city and moved through a brief stretch of farmland before entering a shallow wood, but he found himself walking the streets of a rich suburban neighborhood. How far he had walked he had no clue, but in the back of his mind he somewhat had the feeling that he was several miles away from the Sumeragi family estate: his starting point. Perhaps he had gone there for a friendly visit (_no, that wasn't right...he didn't want to see her_) or maybe it was a family emergency (_that wasn't it either...he would only have gone back if she died and he _did_ remember talking to her_) or for business (_no, not that...he didn't do any constructive family work anymore because he _couldn't).

Wait, was it...? Yeah, that was it, actually. That was exactly the reason why he had gone back to Kyoto to see his grandmother: the family business. He didn't want to see her or talk to her, but before he _had_ told her he'd visit one day. It was _after_ they talked that he vowed he wouldn't go back unless it was for her funeral. But wait, why?

Subaru stopped walking for the first time in hours (_a dull ache_) and tried to remember, reaching out for the spirit of a memory. A friend he once had, how to tie a tie, jumping off a bridge, no, that wasn't why. A stuffed rabbit that reminded him of taxodermy, no, a book he had read translated from another language, nah, cynanide tasted like almonds, what the fuck, that bridge again, no _no_ **no**. A dying kitten freezing by the side of the road, sad but no, reflecting sakanagi onto the weak, not it and he had never had that thought really, a hand plunged into something warm, sexual so no, that damned bridge again, no that was _not **it**_.

...Oh wait, yes it was. He had gone to see her about his job, about how he couldn't continue to exorcise spirits for a price because he was the Sakurazukamori now - he told her what happened, and she...

She cried, Subaru remembered, out of despair, and it was the first time he had ever seen her like that; she wasn't angry with him over what happened on the bridge because it wasn't his fault. She was angry that he hadn't told her sooner, that all that time he had lied to her over the phone and told her he couldn't take various jobs because he wasn't feeling well or it was too far away for comfort or hey there was this special on the television he wanted to watch even though he didn't actually own one, all things he had never said to her before, instead of telling her why: that he spiritually _couldn't_. He was an absolute mess in that respect, like Chernobyl or Yucca Mountain only with yin and yang and light and dark and the Sumeragi family could have figured out how to fix it really they could she said as tears he had never seen streamed down her wrinkled and worn face, he remembered, if only he had told her sooner before he accepted the responsibility that that godforsaken tree, dragon, man thrust upon him.

That man...oh, that's what... She was a frustrated and crushed old woman sitting in her wheelchair, crying openly - something she had probably done only once or twice in her long lifetime - over her only remaining grandchild's bad luck and stupidity. Because that's what it was, she said, for the 13th Sumeragi clan head (_bad luck_) to accept the position of Sakurazukamori because... Lady Sumeragi didn't like the reason he told her for gaining the job and eye, and she had a few choice words about the previous Sakurazukamori that got under Subaru's skin. He couldn't remember the details because it was hazy and unclear in his mind and had anything really been resolved by their argument? he didn't think so.

He wondered if he could get back to Tokyo by Friday: his drycleaning would be available for pickup then. There was an outfit he wanted to wear the next night for when he killed that nuclear physicist who had dangerous ties to the North Korean government but was really _hot_ anyway so really it was a shame because not many men were that good looking, so...

Subaru's cheeks increased to a fiery red against his normally pale skin as he had the decency to look somewhat embarrassed when a wealthy woman honked her car horn at the strange but cute man standing at the entrance to her private drive and blocking her way. He ducked his head and continued walking, having the temporary sense to get out of the street and onto the sidewalk.

He _really_ had to pay attention to where he was going, he decided as he walked along the recently shoveled path, taking note for the first time of how numb his feet felt. That was a minor complaint, however, compared to the pounding headache he had developed as a result of thinking about what had happened, coupled with the fact that he hadn't eaten anything in over a day. Not a remarkable dry spell for Subaru (_no record broken yet_), but then again, he wasn't used to walking as much and as far as he had that day. In fact, since he had become the Sakurazukamori, he had to adjust to an entirely new set of physical actions. No more leaping (_thank you Jackie Chan_) and running after rogue sprits - or _from_ them, either - or frantic motions and energy expended to defend a fragile kekkai. ...Nice and leisurely, a luxurious but deranged existence: he supposed the former assassin spent his days living like that; it was definitely easy to get used to.

Not understanding why, he felt he had to reassure his grandmother that he was still a virgin back there. She cried about his innocence, so he told her that he was still physically chaste and untouched, but that's not what she meant; he thought it was something she _should_ have meant, though, but he didn't suppose she knew the pointedly sexual energy he felt when using onmyoujitsu to kill.

The stitchings and embroidery on the jacket he wanted to wear Saturday night really brought out both colors of his eyes, Subaru thought.

He continued to walk despite the nagging he heard in his sister's voice at the back of his mind telling him that he really should work on getting back home, but something strangely caught his eye and brought all his thoughts and senses back to reality: out of the snow that thickly covered the ground, someone had made a snowman in the center of their front yard. It captured his notice because in addition to the traditional carrot nose and button smile, they had adorned it with a knit cap and scarf as if to keep the structure made of snow warm from the cold.

Subaru oddly saw symbolism in this, and crossed the distance over to the snowman.

The cap and scarf both looked as if they had been made tenderly with love, and their energies wrapped around the lifeless, still, and inanimate body, protecting from the cold with the sentiments of fondness, though it seemed rather silly and redundant to him. A snowman, being made of snow, didn't get cold. In fact, it probably liked the dangerous and freezing wind, he reasoned, and the cap and scarf only stifled his happiness; it was obvious it was all in good intentions, however, because the happiness of snowmen is a subject so rarely debated or even considered.

Reaching out and touching the side of the snowman's face, Subaru found that even adorned lovingly with a hand-knit cap and scarf, it was still as cold as the air around it, as cold as that dead kitten he had encountered at some point during his walk - as icy cold as death itself.

He wondered what that nuclear physicist was into: did he have a girlfriend who would cry for a week then get herself a new man when he was gone? or would he think Subaru equally hot?

His hand caressed the snowman's face lovingly as he recalled the first time he killed someone that he thought fatally attractive, other than the previous Sakurazukamori: the energy was distinctly violent and sexual, everything he associated with that man with a voice like a used car salesman that he loved to hear, even if it was saying that he neither loved nor hated him. His first was a musician and Subaru killed him because the tree wanted to be fed and he was convenient in addition to being ungodly hot. No, he never physically touched the man other than to kill him, but...every time he killed someone he was attracted to, it was like sex (_with him_) without physical contact.

No wonder Seishirou smiled all the time.

His grandmother nearly threw up when he told her he liked being the Sakurazukamori.

The chill of the snowman that he felt through his fingertips (_a treasured sensation_) was enough to excite him and form a familiar sensation that coursed through his veins, similar to stroking the flesh of a dead or dying victim who might have gained visual pleasure from the act if necessary blood wasn't pouring from a new hole in the chest. On a whim, he pressed his lips to the button mouth, noting with increased thrill how the icy snow he touched melted away and made his lips feel bruised as if from a kiss. Like the act of violence and sexual energy melted away the last vestiges of his innocence and made his grandmother cry, tears running down her face like the melted water of snow.

He could show up in the man's bedroom at night and kill him on his bed after a delightful and arousing struggle...

Experimentally Subaru dipped his tongue into the newly formed crevice on the snowman's face, savoring every sensation that ran through him, blissfully unaware that the now-disturbed residents whose property he was on were calling the police.

**End**


End file.
